Page 42 of Something Like Fate

I assumed that would cheer him up, but when I emerge from the bathroom, he’s frowning at his ironing. Ugh. He definitely still misses her.

Must switch gears before he spirals. “Any advice for me tonight?”

He shrugs, inspecting his jeans. “Uh, be yourself?” he suggests.

I park myself on the floor in front of the mirror with my makeup bag. “Real helpful, Tel. Shouldn’t this be the part where you coach me on how to act? What to say? Where you tell me I should tone down my quirky style?”

“I like the way you dress, aside from those elephant-print pants you bought the other day,” he says.

I toss a foundation-blender sponge at him. “Those pants are adorable!” Frankly, they’re not really my style. But I’ve seen so many backpacker girls wearing them, I felt compelled to get a pair too.

“And what do you mean by ‘coach’? In what world do you think I’m qualified to give relationship advice? In case you forgot, my people skills are in the toilet.”

“Teller, you were with Sophie for three years. Clearly you have game,” I point out, dabbing shimmery eyeshadow on my lids.

He flops back on his bed and props himself up on his side, watching me. “You overestimate me.”

“You’re super romantic,” I remind him. “Remember that time you borrowed my starry night projector and set up a whole makeshift bed and movie for Sophie in your living room? Or when I helped you arrange that elaborate scavenger hunt all over the neighborhood?”

He bites the inside of his cheek and sighs, like the memory has taken a year off his life. “Can I tell you a secret?”

“Always.”

“I hated doing all that. They were so stressful. I was always trying to think of something big to top the last one. It was impossible to genuinely surprise her. Actually, on Valentine’s Day last year, we got into afight and she told me she hated all the huge gestures. She thought they were hokey and desperate.”

“But she loved them,” I say, recalling the first birthday I helped Teller plan. I’d been there for the surprise, releasing the balloons and hitting Play on their “song” (Ed Sheeran, which surprised me since Teller once told me he didn’t trust his face). The whole reveal was quite cinematic, with Sophie crying and dramatically leaping into Teller’s arms.

“She acted like she did because she felt like she had to,” he says.

“I don’t get it. What girl wouldn’t want a huge gesture like that?”

“That’s the thing. It’s proof of how little I actually knew about her.”

“Okay, but that’s kind of bullshit. You were together for three years. She should have been honest with you,” I say, gripping my makeup brush, angry on Teller’s behalf.

He shakes his head. “She was right, though. I knew she wasn’t the kind of girl who watched rom-coms. She wasn’t mushy or interested in talking about her feelings. So why did I expect her to be comfortable with all these public, grand gestures? It never made sense, and I was too self-absorbed to even notice or care.”

I know I won’t change Teller’s mind on this anytime soon. When he’s stuck in a vortex of self-loathing, it’s nearly impossible to pull him out. So I pivot. “Okay, well, my point still stands. You have game, even if you don’t think so.”

“Coming from the girl who could make friends with a rock. But thanks, Lo.”

I check my full reflection in the mirror, and my findings are grim. I seriously need to brush my hair. Blot my forehead. Maybe change my entire outfit. “Do you think I need to be more—”

He cuts me a serious look and sits up. “This isn’t a nineties rom-com. You look great. You don’t have to change a thing.”

“Even my tendency to bring up my dead mom?” I ask. I’d told Caleb about my mom out of the blue while we were walking through the Borghese.

He tilts his head. “Okay, yeah. It might have been preferable to ease him in there. But you’ve never really been the type to beat around the bush. If he really is the one, he should probably get to know the real you, not a sanitized version.”

“Heisthe one,” I say, finger-combing a tangle at the back of my head. I ignore the zip down my spine when our eyes meet in the mirror and look away.What is going on with me?I really need to get some air.

Teller stands, brushing the wrinkles from his shorts. “Okay. Any idea what time you’ll be back?”

“We’ll see where the night takes us,” I chirp, motoring around to grab my earrings from my suitcase.

He blinks. “Oh, okay.”

It’s only after I see Teller’s face that I realize how that sounded. I didn’t mean to insinuate anything sexual happening tonight—not that I’d be against it. But backtracking and explaining would probably just make it sound worse. The room suddenly feels smaller. Too small, like the four walls are closing in, inch by inch. With only the hiss of the cooling iron to quell the silence, Teller busies himself on his phone while I hurriedly put in my earrings. I do a quick check in the mirror. My dress isn’t horribly wrinkled or tucked in my underwear, and my eyeliner isn’t too aggressive. Check.

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